Staying competitive, yet efficient, is a priority for businesses. Increased productivity can boost innovation, but evolving your IT processes to keep pace can be a challenge for smaller teams. A Microsoft consulting service can provide the experienced guidance necessary to achieve these goals through a cloud migration, integrating Microsoft and third-party apps and optimizing your current environment through customization or automation.
A Microsoft consultant can have a huge impact on how your business leverages Office 365’s full potential. Regardless of whether your ultimate goal is to completely overhaul your IT infrastructure or simply fine-tune your current processes, finding the right Microsoft consulting partner can help you accelerate their completion.
What is a Microsoft Consultant?
A Microsoft consultant is a third-party service with extensive training across Microsoft programs and applications. Their experience may cover the following common applications:
- Azure
- Dynamics
- Entra ID
- Exchange Online
- Intune
- Microsoft Apps for Business
- Microsoft Copilot
- Microsoft Defender
- Power BI
- Power Platform
- SharePoint and OneDrive
- Teams
They align your business goals with Microsoft tools, overseeing the delivery, implementation and management of your Microsoft platform. Specifically, Microsoft consultants help streamline your workflows, resulting in greater efficiency. They ensure your teams can share documents and files quickly and securely, even from remote locations, boosting productivity and collaboration.
A consultant may perform one or more of the following, depending on what level of service you require:
Assessment:
Which subscriptions and licensing packages would work best for your business? Alternatively, if you already use Microsoft products, are you using the right ones to their full potential? A consultant and their team will use an assessment to take a deep dive through your internal processes. This will help you determine whether you should make tweaks to your Microsoft platform by modifying your licenses to accommodate either expected growth or shrinkage in your workforce, integrating other apps or adding customizations via Power BI to improve your efficiency and effectiveness.
Is your company moving from an older version of Microsoft into the cloud? Business acquisitions or mergers may also require a migration as you combine tech stacks and merge systems. Emails, documents, spreadsheets and entire databases are all at stake during these transitions and a poorly executed migration could result in data loss or keep users from completing critical tasks. A Microsoft consultant can prepare, execute and follow up on migrations to ensure important data and documents aren’t lost in the process, which keeps your workday moving on schedule.
Deployment:
For a single user, it’s a simple matter to install Microsoft programs on a desktop or laptop. Doing so across multiple users, computer equipment and other operating systems is a much larger undertaking. Deployment complexity increases with scale, but a consultant has a deep wealth of experience in managing deployments of all sizes to ensure you’re able to preserve business continuity and start running on day one.
Optimization:
A Microsoft consultant can create customized features using Power Apps and Power BI for additional personalization. They can also take processes that are frequently repeated and automate them to reduce your workload.
Security, Governance and User Management:
Maintaining a secure and well-governed Microsoft platform helps prevent external bad actors from compromising your systems and keeps internal users from accidentally encountering sensitive information they shouldn’t have access to. A consultant can track, add, remove and manage users, ensuring their credentials make sense for their roles.
They can also strengthen your data governance policies to keep data secure, private, accurate and usable throughout its lifecycle. As your internal and external data storage increases, you’ll require a strategy that reduces your costs, balances the risks and aligns with your business objectives.
Legislative and Industry Standard Compliance:
Storing data in the cloud? Cloud-based infrastructure can meet strict compliance standards required by HIPPA, DFARS, FINRA, NIST and more. Your consultant will work with you to configure your security and data settings, so they meet the high standards required either by industry or relevant regulations.
Training and Education:
Training your workers to adopt and efficiently use apps like SharePoint, Outlook, Teams, Excel, Power BI, Word and more should be a priority. The more comfortable your workforce is with using Microsoft products, the more productive they can be. If needed, your consultant can also arrange for your staff to undergo security training to help prevent cybersecurity attacks.
General Management and License Maintenance:
Every type of technology requires constant monitoring and maintenance to remain in good health. Your consultant can offer security and operational monitoring, data backup monitoring as well as incident response services to ensure continued functionality and security.
How Do You Know You Need a Microsoft Consultant?
The key indicators it may be time for you to engage with a Microsoft consultant:
- Underutilization of M365 licenses
- Potential cloud migration or M&A tech stack combination
- Struggles securing, maintaining or managing your current Microsoft platform
- Security vulnerabilities are present in your system or you’d like to take a more proactive approach to cybersecurity protocols
- A more tailored approach to your Microsoft 365 strategy is required, such as third-party app or tool integration
- Your workers need additional training or education to either maintain or make better use of their technology environment
What to Look for in a Cloud-Managed M365 Services Partner
Once you’ve determined you’re interested in Microsoft consulting services, it’s time to select your partner. There are several key factors that should influence your decision, but asking about the three characteristics below can help ensure you find the right fit for your needs.
Experience
When considering partners for your cloud M365 services, experience stands out. Their experience should cover crucial tools like Power Platform and Dynamics 365 that speak to your particular business needs and goals.
Look for designations such as a Microsoft Solutions Partner and Microsoft Premier Support for Partners. A Microsoft Premier Support partner can be particularly cost-effective. They can provide enhanced technical support such as opening prioritized tickets on your behalf with Microsoft. They may also be able to offer services such as risk assessments, which identify potential problems and new business opportunities. Getting this level of service directly from Microsoft comes with a $200,000 price tag, which is what makes a Microsoft Premier Support partner so valuable.
A Microsoft Azure solutions architect designation can also be a great sign that you’re working with a consulting service with sufficient Microsoft experience. Having access to an Azure solutions architect entitles you to a deeper level of experience in designing cloud and hybrid solutions. These architects hold advanced knowledge of IT operations, including in areas like business continuity, data platforms, disaster recovery, networking, security and virtualization.
Flexibility
A flexible partner is adept at adjusting their approach to accommodate your evolving business needs, whether due to staffing changes, expanded operations or sudden market trends. Whether it’s overcoming an unexpected challenge or taking advantage of an opportunity on the fly, your technology infrastructure should be able to scale up or down as necessary. Why should your Microsoft partner be any different?
Responsiveness and Availability
Responsiveness and availability are paramount. Emergencies don’t always stick to the standard nine-to-five schedule. Critical situations may demand immediate attention, even outside normal working hours. How quickly your consulting service is able to respond to your requests and make themselves available matters, especially since it can impact your operations and customer relationships. Ask any potential partner about their response times and availability to ensure a swift turnaround.
Managing your Microsoft Enterprise account can be a full-time job, which could prove burdensome to a small internal IT team. Outsourcing critical functions, such as deployment or migration management, to a Microsoft 365 consultant can reduce that burden while creating a more secure technology environment, a better-trained workforce, stronger data governance policies and more mobility to work anywhere you’d like with the cloud.
Anders Technology works closely with clients to help determine their next steps on their Microsoft journey. As a Microsoft Solutions Partner, advisors can provide guidance that takes you from licensing to comprehensive management. Learn more about our services, and the associated costs, by requesting a meeting below.
